


Sunflower

by nightsstarr



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Porn With Plot, fucking while pining, past dorolix, richboy Felix, wedding singer Annette
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2021-02-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 22:29:26
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 17,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25373926
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nightsstarr/pseuds/nightsstarr
Summary: Felix Fraldarius, B-list socialite, one of two heirs of the sprawling Aegis Real Estate Corporation. Currently wrapped around the finger of Annette Dominic. Not looking to make any changes any time soon.
Relationships: Annette Fantine Dominic/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Comments: 36
Kudos: 80





	1. Silver Sedan

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to the many people who let me spam their inboxes with this fic, without you this would not have come to fruition. Thank you to netteflixandchill2020 for helping me push to get this idea on paper, I'm going to be getting almost all of my board fills from this fic! So expect frequent updates this month
> 
> The title is from the song Sunflower, that famous song from Into the Spiderverse, because of these lyrics:  
>  _Some things you just can't refuse  
>  She wanna ride me like a cruise and I'm not tryna lose  
> Then you're left in the dust, unless I stuck by ya  
> You're a sunflower, I think your love would be too much_

Felix sighed, bored, and he set his glass of wine down on the table moodily. His father glanced over at him reproachfully, but he was deep in conversation with Lonato, one of the partners of Rowe, Inc, and he didn’t bother to chide him. Glenn was on the dance floor with Ingrid, and her ring was glittering on her finger as she smiled up at him. 

Blech.

He took another sip from the glass he just set down and pursed his lips. The wine wasn’t very good. It was probably unreasonably expensive, but to Felix it just tasted like fruit. It was the kind of wine Dorothea would have liked, he thought as he took another sip.

His newly minted ex-girlfriend after six months of dating--a new record for Felix, if anyone was keeping track, which he was sure someone, somewhere on the internet was. Youtube cover-artist gone opera star, she was supposed to be sitting in the seat next to him. When they first started dating their schedules were perfect for Felix--he had just become the head of the eastern branch of Aegis Corporation, the real-estate business that had been passed through his family for decades, or even centuries, according to some history books. He was busy and often traveling out of state, and at the time Dorothea was still settling into her role of breakout star at the Fhirdiad opera company. They were both busy, and when they did have time to see each other he stayed in her townhouse on the upper floor of a ritzy apartment building not far from the opera house, and they’d be apart again for at least a week, sometimes more. 

As things settled down for him and Dorothea became more accustomed to her own busy schedule, she began getting more needy, more insistent that he _make_ time for her. His brother getting engaged seemed to be the nail in the coffin, because she started asking him about a _timeline_ and _where did he think they were going_ and _did he think he would ever want kids._ He brought her to a nice dinner last week and broke up with her the way Ingrid advised.

Apparently, she’d thought that the invitation to a nice dinner meant that he was thinking of proposing to her, and when she told him this he laughed, and that was the end of that. That was only five days ago, and Felix had pretty much not left the house since then, since he had no desire to deal with the amount of attention that came from breaking up with a D-list celebrity. He tried to skip out on going to this gala, but his father wouldn’t hear of it. Glenn and Ingrid had done a pretty good job of diverting attention away from him, anyway. Everyone suddenly seemed invested in their relationship, and Felix could only roll his eyes at the picture of them walking into the gala hand-in-hand that popped up on TMZ’s website minutes after they arrived. 

Dorothea had decided not to come, which was fine by Felix. She was probably still a bit pissed off at him, anyway.

The idea of _proposing_ after six months. Ingrid and Glenn had dated since high school. They moved out of the Fraldarius house and into a tacky McMansion outside of Fhirdiad and they _still_ didn’t get engaged for another year. 

Dimitri, for some reason, insisted on explaining the logic that Dorothea used, that they had both settled into their successful careers, that she’d been talking to him about more serious things, that she obviously wanted to settle down. Felix still had him blocked on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram for that. Sylvain could see nothing but humor in the whole situation, and Felix didn’t block him but he was still in the middle of ignoring his texts.

So when his father _forced_ him to come out to this gala for the Church, he knew that he was going to have a downright terrible time. 

The hall was all carpeted reds and whites and crystal, and Felix thought the whole thing was awfully gaudy for a religious organization. The Archbishop herself had not turned out for the celebration, but her right hand and his daughter had turned up. Felix met Flayn a few times, although she probably didn’t remember him. It seemed that she’d been in charge of throwing this event together, and she stalked through crowds with a headset buried in her bright green curls and a clipboard in her hands. Felix almost felt bad for her. 

He sipped at the wine in front of him and grimaced. No chance of getting anything harder than this at a church-sanctioned event. 

“Would you get up?”

He glanced over his shoulder at Ingrid, who was frowning down at him. 

“Your brother won’t stop worrying about you, even though it’s pretty obvious that you’re being a baby. So get up.”

“Knock it off, Ingrid,” Feix sighed, and he raised the wine glass to his lips but ingrid snatched it out of his fingers. 

“No.” She pulled his chair out from the table and tipped it forward so he had to stand. “Get up.”

“Would you stop it? You’re making a scene.”

“I don’t care.”

He frowned down at Ingrid, but she had been long immune to his glares and she dragged him away from the table. 

“You’re _embarrassing_ me,” he told her as she pulled him up the stairs to the dance floor. 

“Deal with it,” she said simply.

He wrenched his arm out of her grip and, accepting his fate, walked with her to the edge of the dance floor. Ingrid stepped into him, and he recognized the terrible perfume that Glenn bought for her for one of the festival days. Dorothea had suggested it. 

Ingrid pulled him into her with her hand grasping at his, and he felt more like a boy being pushed around than the eligible bachelor celebrity gossip magazines claimed he was. 

The music wasn’t even very good for dancing, it was all thrumming string bass and plucky piano and a soft woman’s voice singing over it in a way that almost made him feel calm and sleepy. The band was above them, up another set of stairs, and Felix could only just make out the edges of copper hair and a stand microphone clutched in two hands. 

“I don’t see why you’re so upset,” Ingrid began, and Felix rolled his eyes at her. “You _wanted_ to break up with her. You’d been saying so.”

“I know,” Felix said. He wanted to stop dancing but Ingrid pulled him along by his arms. “I don’t know, it’s just… things were nice the way they were. And then she wanted to go and… be all clingy.”

“She wasn’t clingy,” Ingrid informed him, as though she were the expert on his own relationship. “She wanted to see you more than twice a week. We’re adults now. This is what relationships are like. Just admit that you didn’t like her very much.”

“I liked her fine,” Felix protested. “I just don’t want to go and _get married._ I’m not _crazy._ No offense.”

“There are people who get engaged after six months, you know. It’s not that crazy.”

“Yeah, idiots. I don’t see how you’re taking her side. You and Glenn have been together since you were fourteen."

”Yeah, but things were different. My family’s been struggling with the business, you know that. And I’ve been trying to help. Glenn was doing _a lot_ of work until you came and took over the east branch. Now that Galatea Publishing is downsizing and Glenn’s back to a normal workload, we’re _finally_ in a place where we can start thinking about that. I would’ve married him when I was eighteen, if I could’ve.”

He stilled, and he resisted Ingrid’s efforts to get him dancing again. “Why are you telling me this?” he asked, annoyed. “I get it. I’m a terrible fucking person.”

“That’s not what I’m trying to say,” Ingrid said, and she put her hands on her hips as she frowned at him. “You need to think about what you want to make you happy. I get that Dorothea isn’t it, but _something_ about her must have made you really happy, because you’ve been insufferable since then.”

The song ended, and the microphone squealed a bit before the singer’s voice washed over the hall. “Miss Flayn has asked me to let everyone know that desserts are being served as we speak! We’re going to take a little break, and then Flayn is going to give a speech thanking the bigger donors. We’ll be back after that!”

People started dissipating around them, heading to the desserts, probably, but Felix had no interest in that, so he stayed where he was, frowning down at Ingrid. 

“I know you, Felix,” she said, and she tucked her chin-length hair behind her ear. “You should take the time to figure out what you want.”

“I want some air,” he answered, and he turned away from her, feeling annoyingly like he’d lost some unspoken battle.

Ingrid was always acting like she knew everything. 

It’s true that she was one of his oldest friends--except, perhaps, for Dimitri, whose father had been best friends with his father, but they were much closer when they were kids. Dimitri went through a weird phase after his parents’ untimely deaths, and Felix wanted to reach out to him but he was too selfish and incompetent to know how. Things seemed fine between them now, and Dimitri had gotten a lot of help since then, but things weren’t the same. There was also Sylvain, but he was a few years older than Felix and there were times that Felix felt he really didn’t understand him at all. Ingrid had been a more constant presence throughout his life, first as his own friend, then as Glenn’s girlfriend _and_ his friend, and he’d been telling people she was his sister when they confused her for his girlfriend for years now. 

But she didn’t _know_ him. She couldn't. He barely knew himself.

That was one of the things he liked about Dorothea--she wasn’t all roses and honey all the time. She was pretty, and surprisingly sharp, and she let him talk about real shit and she talked about her own real shit. They’d get drunk and go back and forth about classism and feminism and other isms that Felix didn’t want to think about just then. And then they’d have sex, and she might sleep in his bed overnight but she’d go back to her fancy townhouse the next day and he’d see her again in a few days or at one of her shows. 

And that _worked_ for him. 

And she just had to go and ruin it. 

“Oh! Excuse me!”

He hadn’t been paying attention to where he was going, and a ginger-haired girl who barely made it past five foot barrelled into his shoulder as she came down the stairs.

He put his arms out to steady her and she clutched at his sleeve as she regained her balance. 

“You alright?” he asked, a little confused about how she’d run into him so hard--she must have seen him coming, unless she’d been just as spaced out as he was. 

"Yep! Fine!" She smiled up at him, and she was blushing very slightly, embarrassed by her clumsiness, he supposed. 

She wore a white gown, and her hair was plaited into twin french braids that rested on her shoulders and were tied off with little bows. A chunky gold bracelet jingled on her wrist, and a matching necklace hung around her neck. 

"It's these shoes," she admitted, and she lifted the skirt of her dress so he could see the rounded toes of nude-colored heels. "We had to wear white and I didn't know until like, two weeks ago, and I've been busy so I bought them on Amazon and they're way too big."

"Uh-huh," Felix answered, although he hadn't asked. She spoke quickly and defensively and it was a little hard to keep up.

"I know I shouldn't buy shoes online, my mom always tells me, but you know, Mercie bought a cute pair and they fit great, so I thought it would be _fine._ But nooo, nothing ever works out that easy, right?"

"I have… no idea what you're talking about."

Her blush deepened, and Felix couldn't help but think it was pretty adorable the way her round cheeks flushed with color against her pale skin. "Right. Why would you? I got a little off track there. Sorry I bumped into you! I'm just trying to get to the cake."

"Of course," he said, and she smiled up at him before bounding down the next set of stairs.

He paused, and glanced around for Ingrid or Glenn or his father, and seeing none of them, he continued after her.

He caught up to her easily, given the awkward way she was walking in her too-big shoes, and he took a ceramic plate as they approached them in the dessert line.

The ginger-haired girl reached for one at the same time, and her fingers brushed his hand.

"Oh!" Shd whirled around, the skirt of her gown catching around her legs. "Sorr--it's you again!"

"Yeah, well. I could use some dessert." He had no intention of eating any of the selection that they were approaching.

"Are you sure you're not just following me?" she asked, raising her eyebrows until they disappeared under her bangs. 

A blush was creeping up from his neck. He must look like a complete idiot.

"Kidding," she said with a laugh, and giggled at her own joke.

He should have stopped then, but he gently asked, "You're part of the band, aren't you? You're the singer?" 

"Sure am. What, do I not look rich enough to fit in?"

"Well, I don't think many of the guests here buy their shoes from Amazon."

"My dress is from there, too. Don't tell anyone."

He swept his eyes over her, perhaps too slowly. The dress was plain, an off white that made her bright hair and red lipstick stand out. It was sleeveless and high-cut, and it was tight but not immodest. It had knee-length slits on either side in the front, and fell just to the floor over her shoes. Elbow-length gloves pulled the ensemble together and dressed it up a bit.

"Guess Amazon has better designers than I thought," he said. It didn't really occur to him how flirty the statement was until he'd said it.

She didn't seem embarrassed, but instead she leaned toward him conspiratorially. "I know, right? It's not bad at all! My favorite part is the bow."

He ran his eyes over her again. "Bow?"

"It's in the back. You'll see it."

The line inched forward, and she peeked around people blocking her view of the spread.

"Oh, Saints. I’m _starving._ Flayn asked us to play through dinner, which I usually don't like doing because like, when am I supposed to eat? But she told us we'd get forty-five minutes off for dessert, and everyone knows that dessert is the best meal of the day." 

"I don't think dessert actually counts as a meal," Felix said conversationally.

"What, shut up, of course it does. A day without dessert is like… like… well, it's sad! If you don't eat dessert every day, you should start. Does wonders for you, mentally."

"Is that so?" 

"Totally. It's self-care."

He chuckled at that. Very slightly.

"Don't knock it until you try it!"

The line moved forward again, and she turned to catch up to it. They approached the first of the desserts now, a fancy tiered plate with fluffy puff-pastries glazed in chocolate stacked on top.

Oh… he spotted the bow, there on her lower back, just before the dress followed the curve of her--

"As I was saying," she said, and he had to step up close to her to properly hear. "I can't have too much dairy while I'm singing, and these profiteroles are probably filled with sweet cream, but…"

She popped one into her mouth, pushing it between her bright red lips with a manicured finger. Her eyelids fluttered closed as she enjoyed the dessert, and she tilted her chin to the ceiling as she chewed. 

What _the hell_ was wrong with him? He couldn't stop watching her, and he even felt a new blush creep up the sides of his neck.

"Self care!" she finished, grinning, and he had to look down at the polished floor to keep himself from staring.

"Ha, yeah," he answered, completely floored and unsure of what to say, exactly.

The singer filled her plate with different selections of cakes and cookies, and Felix even grabbed a cinnamon-dusted pastry for himself, although it was more an attempt not to seem too weird for following her there and then not getting anything.

"You can come sit by me, if you want," Felix offered as they looped around, away from the desserts and back to the main hall. "There's an empty seat at my table." 

"Oh," she said, and where they were standing underneath one of the chandeliers, her wide eyes seemed blue and green and gray all the same time. "I… I can't. Flayn saved a meal for us upstairs, and the rest of if the band is expecting me back."

Felix nodded. "Yeah, no. I get it."

"I appreciate the offer, though. And I had a nice time bumping into you."

 _Ask for her phone number,_ Sylvain's voice echoed in his head, but she just politely rejected sitting next to him, he didn't need to put her on the spot again.

"It was nice… being bumped into," he answered. Her smile turned more genuine and less sheepish and something in his chest melted.

Rodrigue was still talking with Lonato when Felix set his plate with the lone pastry on it down on the pristine tablecloth.

"Felix, did you know that Mr. Rowe has a daughter around your age?" he asked, as though that were the most interesting thing he'd learned lately. 

"Good for him," Felix said, and his tone was rude and impolite. He didn't care. He lifted his glass of wine to his lips.

"Look at Felix, eating dessert for the first time in his life."

Felix glared over the top of his wine glass at Glenn and Ingrid as they slid into their chairs next to him. 

"Fuck off, Glenn."

Rodrigue glanced sharply over to Felix, who ignored him as he set down his glass.

"I grabbed a few of those cinnamon things, too," Glenn admitted, gesturing to his plate. There were a few of the pastries, and a wide assortment of other things--fresh fruit, cupcakes, those profiteroles--and Ingrid was already picking at things.

"Don't girls usually go on a crazy diet when they get engaged?" Felix demanded.

"Don't be rude," Ingrid chided, gesturing at him with her fork. "I haven't even gone shopping for a dress yet. I have time."

He sat, trying not to feel dejected, and bit into the cinnamon pastry. It was too sweet and he pushed the plate over to Ingrid as feedback filled the hall.

"Thank you everyone for joining us tonight!" Flayn's voice greeted them through speakers throughout the hall. "We'll begin the evening by thanking our donors, including the esteemed Aegis Corporation and Blaiddyd Tech."

* * *

Once Flayn was done speaking, after an _ungodly_ amount of time, the music started up again. Glenn and Ingrid disappeared onto the dance floor, and his father disappeared into a group of rich CEOs or something, and Felix sat and listened as the ginger girl sang.

The music cut, finally, and Flayn was speaking into the speakers again, and Felix was the damn gala was finally ending. He wasn't quite to leave the hall yet, though.

"We're going," Glenn told him as he pulled his jacket off the back of a chair, Ingrid nestled against his arm. "You didn't want to hang around, did you?"

"Um, yeah. I think I'll stick around, talk to Flayn for a minute. I'll get a ride home."

Glenn was furrowing his brow at Felix like he'd said something absolutely ridiculous, and Felix slid his hand into his pocket and frowned.

"Fine, whatever,” Glenn said, not pushing the matter. “If you want a ride later, shoot me a text."

"I'm _fine."_

"I know. Just in case."

Once Glenn, Ingrid, and his father disappeared down the wide steps to the exit outside, Felix realized that he wasn't exactly sure what he was doing. There were still plenty of people around, but the crowd was thinning. Trying to be subtle, he made his way up the carpeted stairs, past the dance floor, which was only populated by people talking to each other now in groups of threes and fours. He continued up, past that, and he found that the spot where the band had been was now empty, the stand microphone the only thing left where they had been.

He wondered if it would be _too_ weird to ask Flayn for her contact information. They’d genuinely hit it off, he’d thought. 

It would probably be best to wait a few days, see if he was still thinking about her when the image of her bright red hair and wide blue eyes weren’t playing in his mind when closed his eyes. 

It was kind of nice, the way he was feeling about this random girl. Although he and Dorothea hadn’t been apart for that long, it had been admittedly a few months since he’d felt this way about her. Not that he didn’t respect her or enjoy her company, but the feeling faded after a while. He didn’t even really realize it until now. 

Dejected, he made his way down the stairs. It would be kind of stupid to leave and show up at the house so soon after everyone else had left. Maybe he could get a ride to Dimitri’s or something. 

He already ordered an Uber and cut around to the back exit of the banquet hall, away from the crowds, when a hollow thud and discordant notes caught his attention. 

His heart leaped when he peeked around a set of hedges to find Annette struggling with a case that was certainly bigger than she was, lit in the brake lights of a white van. 

He cancelled his Uber and hurried over to her to reach around and lift the case by its handle. 

“Oh!” she gasped, and when she looked up at him he was suddenly nervous that she wouldn’t remember him. Her smile eased this fear, and her eyes lit up as she said, “It’s you!” 

“Yeah. What are you doing with this? It’s bigger than you are.”

“Well, Aaron is driving the van so I offered to carry--”

Felix lifted it even further away from her and she dropped her hands to her sides.

“Okay, fine then. Just set it over with the rest of the stuff,” she said, and she pulled open the back door of the van. He slid the case in amongst the other equipment. One of the other members of the band, a skinny guy dressed in all white, glanced over at him as he went into the hall through a side exit. 

“Thanks for the help,” she said, and she smiled up at him.

He looked down at her, unsure of how to continue. “I--I’m glad I bumped into you again,” he said sincerely. 

She bit down on her lower lip as she looked up at him, and her eyelashes fluttered against her copper bangs. “It was me who bumped into you last time.” 

She was looking up at him expectantly and it made him nervous, and the other members of her band kept glancing at them as they walked by. “I’d like to keep bumping into you. Maybe I could, I don’t know, get your number?”

The sound of van doors slamming shut interrupted them, and one of the guys called, “Annette, you good?”

Felix glanced over his shoulder at one of them, who was frowning over at them, bathed in the light from the van. 

“Yeah, great. My car’s just over there.” She reached into her bag and clicked a button and a flash of headlights from beyond in the parking lot lit up. 

“Alright. Give me a call if you need anything.”

More doors closed, and the engine revved, and when the van pulled away she looked a little bit more relaxed. “Yeah, I can give you my number. I think that’s a good idea.”

Relief sank through him, calming the electricity zipping painfully through his blood. He pulled out his phone and handed it to her, and when she handed it back she’d entered “Annette 😘". 

“Now you,” she said, and she passed him her phone--an older, clunkier version of his own, he couldn't help but notice. He typed in his name for her, without any emojis to to dress it up. 

"Felix," she said as she looked into her phone's screen. 

Warmth spread through his chest, and for some reason he found his face warming up.

She slipped her phone into her bag and looked up at him with a smile. "You can walk me to my car, if you want."

"Yeah," Felix said, a little dazed from everything happening. Annette already started walking across the near-empty parking lot, and Felix fell into step just behind her. It was a little awkward, or maybe he was nervous. It had been a while since he actually had to ask a girl to go out with him--with Dorothea things kind of fell into place on their own, and she was usually the one to set up dates, especially in the beginning. 

Annette's car was a silver sedan, some superficial scratches in the paint but no major damage, probably a hand-me-down. 

She leaned against her door and smiled up at him. "It was nice meeting you," she told him, one hand curled around the strap of her purse, the other hanging at her side. She hadn't taken out her keys yet.

"Yeah," he agreed. "You too. You, um, you sounded really nice. In there. Singing."

"Oh! Thanks. I only got this job because Flayn came to speak at the school where I teach. I'm glad you liked it, though."

Felix nodded mutely, unable to look away from her mouth. He felt so awkward, so nervous, he wanted to say something or do something but he'd been reduced to staring and nodding.

Annette raised an eyebrow at him and her pretty mouth turned down at the corners into a soft frown. "Not to be like, too forward, or anything, but…" She bit her lip, and he was oddly entranced by the flash of white against half-worn lipstick. "Are you really gonna let me leave without kissing me?"

He looked down at her, surprised, kicking himself, his cheeks flaming. He wasn't stupid enough to not kiss her after that, though, and he took a half-step into her as he cupped her cheek and gently pressed his lips into hers.

He fumbled against her for a moment. She was much shorter than Dorothea, and he wasn't used to leaning down quite so far. He placed his free hand on her hip, carefully, not wanting to touch her more than the invitation warranted, but he needed to ground himself. In turn, she leaned into him and rested her palms on his shoulders, her bag swinging in the shrinking space between them. 

He could taste powdered sugar and chocolate on her lips, and when he adjusted against her after a few moments she tilted her head and deepened the kiss, guiding him into opening his mouth against hers. A burst of butterflies fluttered against his chest, and without thinking he trailed the fingers against her cheek over her jaw and back into her hair, sliding them against soft orange waves. 

She twisted her fingers in his jacket and tilted her head back, and pushed herself onto her tiptoes to press more firmly into him.

It was a nice kiss, and it ignited a sharp fire in his lower belly that grew with each thunderous pulse of his heart. He shifted his hands, bringing the one at her hip to the small of her back and the one in her hair to cup the back of her head. Her palms slipped beneath his jacket against the material of his shirt, and his heart jumped when she pressed the tip of her tongue against his lip. 

It was nice to be kissing someone who was not Dorothea, someone exciting and new who made his heart race and his toes curl.

He pressed into the door of her car, resting his forearm against the frame of the door, and she clutched at the arm wrapped around her back. Her other hand slid up to his face and she was pulling him down and into her, and they were both panting. He felt drunk, much drunker than was warranted from the wine, and any thoughts of pulling away were replaced by the need for her lips against his and her breath on his skin and her fingers as they slid over his arms and his chest and his face.

She tilted her head back, angling out of his reach, and he wanted to trail his mouth down her arched neck but instead he lifted a hand to her chin to angle her kiss-bitten lips back in his direction.

"Felix," she murmured, the hint of a giggle in her voice, and she ducked her head away. "I, um… I have to go. My roommate's expecting me back any minute now."

"Oh," he said groggily. "Right."

Her lipstick was smudged over her mouth, and he knew from the sticky texture that it was smeared over his, too, and he ducked his head as he swiped the back of his wrist over his lips. 

"But that was, um… nice."

He raised his eyebrows at her, unsure of what she meant, and her smile split into a wide grin.

"It was really good, I mean. Very fun."

She was looking up at him in the dim floodlights, pupils blown wide against storm-colored eyes, and it wasn't until her keys jangled in her hand that he came back to his senses enough to take a full step back.

She was smiling at him, and her cheeks were a very endearing shade of pink, and she pulled the door open and sank into the driver's seat. Her keys were full of brightly colored charms that caught the harsh lights from overhead. She turned the keys in the ignition before even shutting the door. 

"I'll text you," she said, and when he nodded she snapped the door shut and wiggled her fingers at him. 

He waved back stiffly, still half-dazed, and she pulled slowly out of her spot and through the lot.

Once her car was gone, he headed across the lot to the front of the building and back inside. He ducked into the bathroom to clean red-pink lipstick off his face and lounged on a fancy armchair in the lobby as he pulled up Uber on his phone.

He was silent the whole ride home, and offered his father only the briefest of greetings when he passed him on the way to his bedroom. He plugged his phone in and set it on his desk to charge.

A few minutes later, while he was flipping absently through channels on the TV, his phone buzzed against the wooden surface, and he nearly leaped across his bed to answer it.

It was just Sylvain, sending him a series of photos from some rooftop bar downtown, and he could only throw his phone down, exasperated, as he thought about how fucked he was.


	2. Studio Loft

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Annette and Felix go on their first date. It doesn't go that great.

"Who is this girl again?" Sylvain asked, not looking away from the wide screen of Felix's bedroom TV. 

"She's a girl," Felix said shortly, frowning down at two shirts he’d laid out over the bed.

"No no, fuck! Dimitri! Get your ass over here you're supposed to be tanking!" Sylvain shouted into Felix's headset. It was one Dorothea got him so he could play with the guys from her apartment, and it was nicer than the one he'd bought for himself. 

Felix glanced up as Sylvain fought valiantly against a horde of zombies surrounding his character, which was the scantily clad anime girl character he always chose, and then threw the controller down as he died.

"You fucking suck at this game," he growled into the mic, and then he turned his attention back to Felix. 

"Yeah, but _who?"_

Felix ignored Sylvain as he picked the collared shirt. It was a bit warm for long sleeves, but he could roll the sleeves. 

"Nobody you know."

"I know everybody. Senators' daughters, CEOs' daughters, heiresses, self-made billionaires, influencers, models…" Sylvain listed. "Felix has _so_ dated a model," he added into the headpiece.

"That girl's father was a designer," Felix reminded him with a roll of his eyes. "And she left to do charity work overseas."

"Still counts," Sylvain said with a shrug. "That girl had some _freaky_ friends."

"Would you shut up," Felix growled as he buttoned up the shirt. "I guarantee you don't know this girl."

"What, did you pick up some no-name off the street?"

"It's none of your business." Felix pulled open a drawer in his dresser which held his ties in a custom organizer, and he took a plain cobalt blue one and slung it around his neck. 

"I don't get what all the secrecy is about," Sylvain said, and he scrolled through a selection menu of battle arenas for the next game. "Wouldn't you want to know if I already dated her? I'm doing you a favor."

"You haven't," Felix said quickly with a roll in his eyes.

"What makes you so sure?"

"Not rich enough."

"It's not the _price tag_ that matters. I've dated plenty of struggling models."

"She's a party singer," Felix admitted, and he tightened the tie around his neck. "And a sub."

Sylvain whipped his head over to Felix and raised his eyebrows so high that they disappeared beneath his tousled hair.

 _"Substitute teacher,_ you idiot."

"Okay, _that_ wasn't my fault,” Sylvain said mildly as he settled comfortably against the foot of Felix’s bed again. “Anyone else would've thought you meant the other thing. What are you doing dating a substitute teacher, anyway?"

"What, am I not allowed?" Felix clasped a watch over his wrist, and Sylvain turned mist of his attention to the game in front of him.

“Hey, you can do what you want. I’m just saying, like… Why stop at McDonald’s when you can have whatever steak you want?”

“You came here with a McDonald’s iced coffee,” Felix pointed out as he selected a blazer from his wardrobe full of suit jackets. 

“Well, it’s not a perfect metaphor! But you know what I mean.”

“Women aren’t _food._ You have issues.”

"I think it's healthy. At least I'm not repressed and angry all the time."

Felix shot his eyebrows up at Sylvain. "Who's repressed?" he demanded.

The redhead glanced up at him, dark eyes halfway between mischievous and sincere like they always were. "Well, maybe it was more before Dorothea. Listen, take these," Sylvain said, and he shoved a packet of condoms at Felix as he passed by.

"Wh--you just walk around with those in your pocket?" Felix spluttered as he let them drop to the ground between them.

"Cheaper than Plan B," he explained with a shrug.

"That's--It's our first date. I don't need a condom."

"So let me get this straight. You're gonna go to McDonald's and sit in the drive through all night and not even eat the burger?" 

"The date is the burger," Felix said stiffly.

"The date is never the burger. Here,”" Sylvain said, and he lunged for Felix's wallet, which he'd left next to his keys. He ripped one condom apart from the rest and slipped it into one of the folds of his wallet. "You'll thank me later."

"Ugh," Felix growled, and he snatched his wallet away from Sylvain but he couldn't even find the condom when he flipped through it, so he shoved it and his keys into his jacket pocket.

Sylvain was settling in his spot at the foot of Felix's bed again. "I'm _always_ an advocate of safe sex," he said into the headset, and he grinned at Felix as the game loaded a new battle arena.

“You gonna be here when I get back?” Felix asked, hoping for a negative answer as he smoothed down the collar on his jacket. 

“I dunno,” Sylvain said, his brow furrowed as he focused on the game. “Have fun. Don’t be weird.”

Felix rolled his eyes as he shut the door behind him.

* * *

The restaurant Felix had chosen for his first date with Annette was a ritzy place, standard for first dates and business meetings and anniversary dinners. It was on the second floor, above a bar that overcharged for cocktails but stayed pretty quiet, for a bar. 

Felix got there early, and he ordered a bottle of wine and scrolled through Twitter to chase away his nerves. 

It wasn’t more than a few minutes later that the hostess approached his table with Annette in tow. 

She looked nice, in a sundress with a ruffled skirt, a cardigan pulled over it, a dangly necklace around her neck. She was blushing, although he wasn’t sure why, and she mumbled a thank you to the hostess as she nearly tripped into her chair across from Felix. 

He looked over at her, an eyebrow raised, and her blush deepened. “Hi,” he said as she slung her purse over the back of her chair. 

“Hi,” she answered, and her tinged cheeks pulled into a smile. “Um, sorry, I--This place is so fancy. I wasn’t--I didn’t know what to wear and now I feel underdressed.” She glanced to a table to their side, where a group of people were dressed in gowns and suit jackets, and Felix waited for her to turn his attention back to him to smile. 

“I think you look nice,” he said, and she blinked at him before a giggle escaped through her lips.

“Thanks,” she said, settling more comfortably into her chair. She opened the menu, although Felix got the feeling that she was only giving herself something to do with her hands. 

None of his dates with Dorothea had ever been like this. She was always the picture of confidence, looking coy as her green eyes pierced into him, but Annette looked nervous and fidgety. 

It made him feel more calm, somehow. 

“Here,” he said, and he poured wine into her glass. 

Her fingers wrapped around the bowl of the glass and she raised it to her lips. There was a lipstick smudge on the glass when she set it down, and Felix couldn’t help but find his gaze drawn to it.

"Do you come here a lot? What do you usually get?" she asked, trailing a manicured finger over the lacquered pages of the menu.

"Oh," he said, reaching for his own menu. "They do fish really well here. Do you like red meat?"

"Um, not really. Saints, everything's so expensive. Thirty-five dollars for a salad?"

Felix waved a hand between them. "Don't worry about that. It's not a problem."

She frowned at him. "Who says you're paying? We can go Dutch."

"I insist," Felix said firmly. "I did pick the place. You can get the next one."

"Oh, someone's confident. Already trying to secure a second date?"

"Can't help myself," he answered with a smirk.

She wound up ordering fish on his recommendation, and that was when he discovered that she had a cutesy dinnertime song that she sang when she ate food she really liked. 

She excused herself to the bathroom after the main course, and Felix took the opportunity to check his snapchat to see if Sylvain decided to leave yet, but the most recent one was a video of Felix's cat scratching him on the arm.

“My! Felix Fraldarius!”

He glanced over his shoulder and he could tell that his expression was far past annoyed. 

Lorenz Gloucester was approaching the table. Felix met him in college. First he hated his haircut, then he hated his snooty personality. He could be pretty friendly according to Ingrid, but once he and Sylvain picked up a strange rivalry Felix abandoned any attempts at getting to know him. He'd grown his hair out since then, at least, and it shone under the ambient lighting of the restaurant. When he reached the table he clapped Felix on the back. 

“Hi, Lorenz,” Felix said in greeting, and he looked forlornly over at Annette’s empty seat, hoping she'd hurry back and give him an excuse to ask Lorenz to leave.

“Imagine seeing you out so soon!” Lorenz said, a glint in his eye that Felix knew indicated his excitement about fresh gossip. 

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Felix demanded, shrugging Lorenz’s hand off his shoulder.

“Well, nothing, of course. It’s just, how long has it been since you and Dorothea fell out? Two weeks?” With the hand that Felix shook off, he brushed his long hair behind his ear as he smiled down at him.

Felix took a sip of his wine to quell the rising annoyance in the pit of his stomach. “I dunno, I’m not really keeping track.”

“Yes, well. Good for you, anyway! After all, Ferdinand tells me he spotted Dorothea downtown in Enbarr last week with a suitor.”

Felix gave Lorenz his best glower.

Annette chose that moment to reappear, and as she pulled her chair back Lorenz looked over at her. Felix wanted to tell him to leave, and rudely, but Annette was smiling as she scooted her chair toward the table. “Hi! My name’s Annette! You’re friends with Felix?”

“Annette,” Lorenz repeated, and Felix knew he was trying to connect the dots and figure out what influential family she came from or what business she was a part of. “The pleasure’s all mine. Lorenz Hellman Gloucester,” he introduced himself. 

“Lorenz was just leaving,” Felix said quickly. 

“I must say, it is nice to see Felix out and about after such a dramatic breakup," he said to Annette conversationally, as though they were old friends. "I heard Dorothea is making a solo album about it,” he added, absolutely grinning, and Felix sharpened his glare. 

“Goodbye, Lorenz.”

“Breakup?” Annette echoed, and Felix rolled his eyes. As though things weren’t awkward enough. 

“Not a big deal. Lorenz is exaggerating.”

“I don’t know about that! Having a whole album dedicated to a breakup is a pretty big deal, I would say.”

“Album?” she asked, and Lorenz frowned at her. 

“Did you... not know?”

Annette was looking at Felix now, clearly hurt. “Know what?”

“I’m sort of on the tail end of a relationship,” Felix explained, in as airy a voice as possible. 

Lorenz looked genuinely confused now, glanced from Annette to Felix and back. “Sorry, Felix, where is Miss Annette _from,_ did you say?”

“Didn’t say, actually.”

Annette was flipping idly through the dessert menu now, and understanding dawned on Lorenz. “Oh. Oh my! I do apologize, I thought that everyone would have known by now? I didn’t know that she isn’t…” He let his voice trail off, probably at a loss for how to put his point delicately. 

“Yeah. _Goodbye,_ Lorenz,” Felix said through gritted teeth. 

“Right, yes. Enjoy the rest of your evening!”

Annette looked up from the dessert menu to Lorenz and pulled a tight smile over her face. “You too!” she said, and she sounded so pleasant that Felix couldn’t tell whether or not she was actually upset. 

“Did you, um, want to get dessert?” he asked gingerly. 

“Yeah,” she said, and she set the menu down. “You didn’t tell me you just came out of some high-profile breakup.”

“Well," he began, but he fumbled to add anything more. “I mean, it’s not really the kind of thing you bring up to cute girls you meet.”

She frowned at him. “Yeah, but, two weeks?”

“It’s _definitely_ been longer than two weeks. I think.”

She raised her eyebrows at him. 

“I haven’t really been thinking about it. I don’t know, things kind of came to an end.”

“What’s _that_ mean?” Annette asked, and she leaned an elbow on the table, suddenly fascinated about the topic. 

Felix felt his face heat up. “Look, I don’t really _want_ to talk about that. I’d rather enjoy our time together.”

She frowned and dropped her head to the menu on the table in front of her. “I think the trifle looks good,” she said softly, and he flagged down the next waitress to pass near the vicinity of the table, hoping that he could fix the tense awkwardness that hung between them with the promise of dessert. 

The trifle _was_ good. Annette was shocked when he told her that he didn't like sweets, but she picked out a few strawberries that were relatively free of whipped cream and passed them to him on a tiny plate. She hummed while she ate, and she wiggled her shoulders back and forth, and she didn't even care when he recorded her doing it and sent it to her on snapchat.

She polished off the trifle while Felix finished his glass of wine. She told him about her dad, and her cousins that lived on the west coast of Faerghus, and her best friend that she met in college. Felix told her a little bit about himself, and his family business, and his relationship with his brother. He didn't like talking about himself, though, and he kept the conversation focused on Annette.

Annette was sipping at her wine when the waiter came by with the check, and it had gotten pretty late. He wasn't ready to end the date just yet, but he figured that he should quit while he was finally ahead.

Felix liked this part of dates. He pulled out his wallet as Annette chewed her lip nervously and he slid out his credit card from its slot. 

Unfortunately, as he did so, the condom that Sylvain had slipped in slid out from the slot, and it spun, the reflective paper catching the candlelight as it spun over the crisp white tablecloth.

He lunged for it, standing to better reach across the table, but it came to rest wedged beneath Annette’s plate. 

She tilted her head and picked it up, and her mouth fell open as she realized what it was and handed it back to him. 

“Uh,” he said lamely, unable to look at her to tell whether she was angry or upset or amused. 

He shoved it into his wallet, not paying any attention to where it went, and she asked, “You always carry those around with you?”

He focused on writing his signature onto the receipt as he stammered, “It’s just the one, actually.”

“Oh. Busy week?”

“What?” He set the pen down and looked up at her, and she was smiling at him, although he thought that maybe it was a little forced. “No, that was the only one I ever had. My idiot friend, he put it in there. As a joke."

“I bet he’d find this whole thing pretty funny, then.” He was relieved that she was laughing about it, but he was also _embarrassed._

“Yeah, he probably would.” He slid the receipt into the pocket in the check holder, and he snapped it closed and looked up to Annette. 

She reached for the check holder then, but he pulled it out of her reach. “What are you doing?”

She frowned at him. “Oh, I’ll just leave the tip.”

“I got it already,” he said. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Oh. Well, let me venmo you for dessert or something. I feel weird that I got something and you didn’t.”

“What? No. I wanted to take you out. Let me pay for it.”

“Felix, really,” Annette said, and she reached across the table but he pulled it into his lap. 

Annette’s hand knocked into his wineglass as she reached, and the contents spilled backward, staining the table and Felix's tie where it splashed onto it. He was able to right the glass before the drink spilled over the edge of the tablecloth. 

“Oh, no,” Annette gasped, and she used her napkin to blot up the mess. “Shoot. I’m sorry. I’m _so_ sorry. I’m so clumsy, goddess. Did any get on you?”

“No,” he said, and he pulled the edge of hais tie away from his shirt. “Just my tie."

Her face was bright red, and he looked away from her as he used his napkin to dry his tie.

"Come back to my apartment," she said with a sigh, and when he looked up she already had her purse over her shoulder. "It's not far. I'll get the stain out before it sets."

He wanted to tell her that he didn't care about the tie, he didn't mind that she spilled his drink on him, but he did want the opportunity to go back to her place and extend the date a little longer. 

She held her phone close as they waited for their ride to show up, and Felix wondered if she was texting the friend she told him about to tell her how awful the date was--or worse, _Googling_ him.

* * *

Anette jammed her key into the lock and leaned heavily on the door as it opened into her apartment. 

It was a studio, smaller than Felix’s living room overall, but the kitchenette near the entrance was charming, and the bright colors she used throughout the space made it look bigger than it really was. Wide windows opened up to what would have been a nice view of the city if they were several floors up and spiral stairs wound up to the loft, which held a neatly made bed covered in embroidered throw pillows and a bookshelf that took up most of the wall. 

It wasn’t a bad apartment. Not high quality, and small, but perfectly suitable for a woman her age in the city. 

Annette sighed as she tossed her purse onto the counter. “Here, goddess. Give me your tie.”

Felix raised his eyebrows at her and tugged the knot at his throat to loosen it, then passed it over to her. “It’s really not a big deal,” he said, but she was already rummaging through her cabinets on her tiptoes. 

“I know, let me just fix it so you can leave our terrible date with your tie intact, at least.”

“It wasn’t terrible,” he said quickly, and Annette shot him a scathing look as she let water run from her faucet. “It wasn’t great,” he allowed, and she turned her attention to his tie again. “I still had a nice night.”

“A nice night,” Annette repeated as the water started to steam. _“That’s_ what you want to hear. I know it was my fault, I was all… freaked out, I don’t know.”

“I could’ve chosen a setting more appropriate for both of us,” Felix said, and he leaned on the counter and watched as she ran the tie under a heavy stream of hot water. 

She glanced over to him, still looking tense, before turning off the water and taking the bottle of white vinegar she’d taken from the cabinet and pouring it directly over the stain. “Yeah, I guess so.”

“I liked talking with you. And I liked your song.” 

“Don’t tease me,” she groaned, and she set the tie down on her counter before reaching for the fridge. Felix watched as she pulled out a bottle of white wine, and then two coffee mugs. “I’m pouring two to be polite, but if you don’t drink one I’ll just have both.”

“Was it really _that_ bad?” Felix asked as she poured into the mugs and placed a stopper over the bottle. 

“No, I’m sorry, I’m being really--I just feel _bad._ You took me to such a nice place and I weirded out and ruined your tie.” She exited the kitchenette, leaving Felix’s tie to soak in vinegar, and she took one of the mugs and sat on her bright teal couch. The only lights she’d turned on were lights beneath the cabinets in the kitchen, but the ambient light from the city that filtered in through thin vertical blinds was enough to bathe the apartment in artsy semi-light. 

Felix took the second mug and joined her in the living room. The lofted bedroom was above them, and it made the space feel much smaller. “I didn’t really think you were being that weird.”

“I didn’t realize that people would, like, _recognize_ you. I didn’t know you were like. A big deal.” She took a sip from her mug and scooted over to the arm of the couch, inviting him to sit, too. 

“No, I know. I should’ve warned you. I didn’t think of it because--” he began, but he cut himself off quickly. It felt like a dick move to tell her that he usually only went out with girls who were also occasionally recognized by the paparazzi. To cover the awkward silence, he took a sip from the mug, and he almost gagged on the sweet, bubbly drink that Annette apparently considered ‘wine’. 

“You date famous girls, I get it. Goddess. Why even ask me out, then? I’m great, don’t get me wrong, but why me?" She paused and looked up to him, and her expression was obviously upset and she was clutching her mug with two hands. "Why date a wedding singer when you could have an opera star?”

She _did_ google him, he knew it. “Didn’t like the opera star,” he said, and he set his mug down on the blocky coffee table. She was sitting with her knees drawn up, her shoulders hunched. She’d practically told him that she was feeling self-conscious and he couldn’t help but feel that he was to blame for that. 

Her fingers tightened around her mug as he scooted closer to her, and she watched him with wide eyes, all blues and deep greens, like the sky after a storm. 

He hesitated, unsure of what exactly he should do next, but the bubbly wine was surprisingly strong, plus the drinks he’d had with dinner, and he swept a stray piece of hair over her ear and he said, “I like you,” and he kept his fingers over her cheek as he leaned in to kiss her. 

She brought one arm up to grasp at his forearm, and as she leaned into him their knees touched. He was trying to be kind and gentle, but she smelled like fruity perfume, and she tasted sweet like her wine, and her fingers were warm against his arm and she opened her mouth under his and he couldn’t think. 

"Wait, wait a second, Felix," she murmured against his mouth, and when he drew back his heart sank--perhaps he'd been too presumptive, or she meant that she didn't want to see him at all anymore--

She took a long sip of the wine in her mug, then set it down next to his.

He wasn't sure if that was a _good_ sign, but then she was throwing a knee over his lap to straddle his lap and cupping his jaw with both her hands and kissing him deeply. Her orange hair fell over his face and it smelled nice, and he twisted a spiral around his finger as his other hand came to rest at her hip.

Annette was kissing a hot trail down his neck, and when her lips touched his collar she didn't hesitate except to loosen the buttons of his shirt.

"Ah… Annette," he groaned, and her fingers slid over his skin, over his chest and the place where his heart was frantically beating.

 _"Oh,"_ she muttered as she dropped her hand over his bare abdomen. He shivered as she traced the line of his abs down to the waistband of his pants. His pants were getting embarrassingly tight from all of her exploring, so he snatched her wrist before her devilish fingers could blaze a featherlight trail over anywhere _else._

"Everything alright?" he asked, and his voice came out soft and low in a way that he didn't anticipate. 

"Yes! Yeah. _So_ good. I can't believe that you're like, rich and handsome and also have a body like Chris Evans."

"Ah," he stammered, not sure what exactly he should say to that.

Annette didn't notice his helpless floundering, and she ran her palms up either side of his abdomen and over his shoulders, and she lowered her lips to his clavicle to continue with her sucking kisses there.

She was so pretty, he thought as he brushed her copper hair out of her face and pulled her closer by the back of her thigh. Not in the polished, professional way a lot of the girls he tended to date were, but in a fresh, natural way. Her wide eyes didn’t have so much makeup on them, just some color over the lids and a gray line at the tips to emphasize how wide they were. Her cheeks were flushed and freckles dotted them, and her dress was cute and flowery and he liked it. 

He was hard now, he couldn’t help it, not with Annette squirming in his lap and touching him all over and kissing him so eagerly. 

She looked at him through her eyelashes and he rested his palm against her jaw, his fingers threading through her hair, his thumb stroking gently against her cheek. She shifted her hips slowly, purposefully, and she clasped her hands together at the back of his neck. 

He pressed his mouth into hers to cover his groan, and he laid his palm against her knee where her dress was riding up. 

“Felix,” she whispered into his jaw, and it sent lightning curling around his spine. 

The city lights threw strange shadows over her face, the angle of her eyelashes cutting across her cheeks, her lips swollen and dark against the paleness of her skin and the whiteness of her teeth. She bit into her lip and raised her blue eyes to his and his cock throbbed beneath her. 

“Do you think it would be okay if we… I mean, I still want to, um…” 

He _tried_ not to smirk at her, but she was so endearingly _cute_ and eager he couldn’t help the smile that pulled at the corner of his mouth. “I think it would be okay, yeah.” As he answered, he trailed his fingers over her waves until he found the pull of her zipper at the back of her dress, and slowly, to give her time to change her mind if she wanted, he tugged it down. 

The dress fell open at the front, and he raised a hand to the patterned bra she wore. It was heavily padded, he could tell as he traced it with his fingers. She made an impatient noise as she rolled her hips against his lap, and he pressed kisses into her throat as he dragged his knuckle over the skin peeking over the cups. She arched her back against him and his throat swelled as a sigh escaped her lips, edged with a throaty moan. 

He dropped his fingers to the hem of her dress and she shifted to allow him to pull it up and over her head, and he dropped it, inside out, onto the floor at their feet. 

She looked down at him and a smile pulled at her cheeks and a giggle bubbled in her throat. 

“What?” he asked, glancing up at her, although his gaze was drawn to the bare skin of her stomach, the bow at the top of her panties, the way her breasts curved to her waist to her hips to her thighs. 

“Nothing, I just. Two hours ago when that guy was grilling you about your ex I didn’t think we’d end up like this.”

He sighed as he looked up at her, and he sank back into the couch, away from her. “I’m sorry about that. I shouldn’t have brought you there. I should’ve--”

“Sh,” she said, and she leaned into him, her hairing falling in a curtain against the side of his face. “I don’t want to talk about that.” She kissed him again, mouth open, tongue pressing against his, and she slipped her fingers beneath his open shirt and pushed it down his arms. 

He passed his fingers over the smooth skin of her thigh before hesitating at the fabric of her panties. She moaned into his mouth as she gripped at his shoulder, and he took that as an invitation to pull them down. 

He trailed his fingers down slowly, and she slipped her hands to the nape of his neck, caressing the fine hairs there, and she leaned into him and pressed fluttery kisses over his jaw.

Her thighs were glistening in the fluorescent light that filtered through the window, and his fingers glided easily down her slit. She gasped and her fingers tightened into his hair, pulling slightly. 

“Felix,” she whispered into his neck, and he pulled at the back of her knee with one hand to spread her legs wider apart. She rebalanced over him and he looked up at her as he slid his index finger inside. She sank down onto him, eager, and his lower belly was so hot, his pants too tight, Annette too warm in his lap. 

“That’s _good,”_ she cooed, and she twisted a hand in his navy hair while she let another trail absently down his chest and over his abdomen. Her fingers were hot through his pants when she dropped them to his thigh, and he groaned when she ran them deliberately over the outline of his cock. 

Her eyelashes fluttered against her cheek as she looked down at her fingers on his crotch. “Here, let me-- _oh,”_ she sighed, and she arched her back when he reached his thumb up to her clit to stroke it. Her fingers were clumsy against his zipper as he worked her, but she pulled it down and urged him to help her pull his pants down. 

She hummed as she traced her fingers over the head of his cock, her movements mirroring his own as he slowly curled his fingers inside of her and brushed his thumb over her clit, and he hesitated against her as she trailed them down to the base. As she traveled up to the tip once again, she curled her fingers around it and he sighed against her copper hair. 

Her fingers were gentle, and she bit her lip in concentration as an occasional sound, a mix between a contented hum and a throaty moan escaped from her swollen lips, and Felix quieted himself just to hear it. He tried to keep his focus on her, but his fingers were getting less deft and more jerky as she pumped his dick in a rhythm that was so slow and purposeful it was almost teasing.

“Hey,” she said, as she continued her languorous movements up and down his cock. “Hey, um,” she said, and she sounded so unsure and nervous that he pulled his hand away to look up at her. “This… I have condoms but they’re, um, up there.” she gestured to the loft, and her bright pink and orange throw pillows.

“I actually…” he adjusted beneath her and slid his finger out of her to push his pants down further so he could reach his wallet in his pocket. The movement made her tighten her fingers around him, and he hoped it seemed natural to jerk his hips against her hand as he reached for his pocket. ”I have the one in my wallet.”

Annette smirked at him, and the image of the condom's shiny wrapper glinting in the candlelight made heat rise to his cheeks again. 

"Might as well put it to good use," she said, a laugh in her voice, and he wanted to kiss it out of her. She stood as he flipped open his wallet, and he glanced down at her panties as they joined the pile of their clothes on the floor.

He plucked the condom out of his wallet, vowing to never carry them there ever again as long as he lived, and he tossed his wallet onto the coffee table with their mugs.

He rolled the condom on quickly and pulled Annette over him by the back of her thigh, and he urged her legs wide apart. “You’re okay?” he asked, suddenly worried that they were rushing a bit, but she scoffed at him and sank down onto him, using her hand to guide him, and his breath escaped in a jerky sigh as she arched her back and ground her hips forward.

“Yeah,” she said, and she smiled at him wide, confident in a way he hadn't seen at the restaurant. “Very okay.”

She lifted herself and sank down again, slow, and Felix traced the curve of her waist to her hip and adjusted them so he was sitting more comfortably. She arched her back as she rode him, and he watched as her breasts bounced almost out of her bra and her hair fell over her shoulder. She held onto his shoulder for balance, and the sounds she made as she sank down his shaft each time reminded him of the first night he met her, her voice the backdrop of that stuffy party. 

He shifted against her, meeting her hips as she sank down to urge her faster. He was starting to pant even though she was doing all the work, the heat in his belly overpowering him, making him warm. 

She'd increased her pace now but Felix was growing impatient, his skin tingling all over, and his fingers were tight over her hip as he tried to spur her on faster.

"Annette," he groaned, unable to keep himself from shifting his hips into her, and he ran his hand over her bottom as she continued. "Fuck. Come here." He pulled her down by her hips, locking himself inside of her, and he bit into his lip as he bucked his hips up into her. "Wrap your legs around me," he ordered, and her hair spilled over her shoulder as she tilted her head at him, but she did as he asked.

Planting one foot onto the carpeted floor, he lifted her and pressed her into the couch, still sheathed inside of her. She squealed as throw pillows spilled onto the floor and knocked against the vertical blinds. Felix didn’t mind them as he settled over her and drove into her, fast and careful not to start out too deep at first to give her a chance to acclimate. 

"Goddess," she whimpered into his chest, and she spread her legs apart even more as he slid in deeper, and then she was taking all of him and rolling her hips to meet him, and he grasped the arm of the couch above her head as leverage to drive into her even harder.

"Felix," she whimpered and he was on the brink of cumming, the desperate way she called his name spurring him on even more. She tensed beneath him and her hips jerked and her walls clenched around him. She moaned one long note that pitched and keened and went on so long it sounded like a song. His fingers spasmed around the arm of the couch as his own orgasm swept over him while she was recovering from hers. 

He jerked into her, urging her legs wide apart, and he spilled into the condom as she stroked her fingers over his shoulder. 

She was panting, her head buried into the bright fabric of the couch, and he rested his head on her shoulder as his heart pounded in his chest. 

They lay still like that until they both caught their breath, and Annette urged him to sit up and she disappeared into the bathroom. He discarded the condom into a garbage bin she kept at the foot of the couch and he collapsed onto it again, bone-tired and sated. 

“Man, that was… really good,” she said when she came out of the bathroom in a fluffy green robe. 

“You sound surprised,” he said, mostly just to tease her. 

“Well! I don’t know!” She crossed her arms sulkily. “I don’t usually do all of _that_ on the first date, not that you would know anything about discretion, Mr. Carries-a-condom-in-his-wallet.”

“That was a one-time thing,” he reminded her.

She sat on the couch and he wrapped his arms around her waist. A siren was wailing from the city below. 

"I don't think we should go out again," Annette said softly, looking down at the tie of her robe. 

Felix looked up at her, suddenly self conscious about his lack of clothes. 

"It's not--I don't know if I'm ready for a relationship right now. I just moved out of my mom's house like, a month and a half ago. I still don't have a full-time job yet. And I don't know your whole situation, but that seems like a lot, too."

He couldn't argue with her, really. He _wanted_ to. But there was no logical way to do it.

"I do want um, _this_ to happen again. I think that _this_ went really well."

"You mean sex?" Felix asked, and Annette kicked her feet up and nestled into his side, burying her face into his chest.

"Yeah," she said, and she glanced up to his face. "I don't know, I know you probably have other options, but I figured I'd put it out there."

"I could do this again," he said quickly, and she lifted herself to her elbow to look down at his face. He slid his eyes away from hers, finding it hard to look at her just then. 

"Yeah?" she asked, and she sounded surprised, so much so that he glanced at her again before looking away.

"Yeah."

"Well. Good, then," she said, and she burrowed into his chest and curled her legs around him.

* * *

It was really late when Felix punched in the code to the gate of Fraldarius Manor. The damn gate meant that Uber drivers couldn't drop him off inside his actual property, which wasn't a problem during the day when he had his own driver to get him places. But at 2AM it was kind of a pain in the ass.

His father was no doubt already asleep, and the house seemed quiet until he approached the hallway with his room. Sylvain was still there, and probably still playing video games. Or at least, he hoped that was the case, since his excited shouts could mean almost nothing good.

He pushed the door open to his room to not only Slyvain but also Dimitri playing a game of FIFA, lounging on his bed like they owned the place.

"The hell are you still doing here?" Felix demanded as he set down his keys loudly. 

Dimitri glanced over his shoulder at him and Sylvain used the opportunity to score a goal, and he shoved Dimitri in the shoulder as the game showed an instant replay.

"Hey, tiger!" he said to Felix with a wink, and Felix winced at the nickname. "How was your night?"

"It was fine. What are you doing here?" he asked Dimitri accusingly.

"Sylvain invited me over."

"You knew I wasn't even here."

"What's the matter, Felix? Feeling worn out? Tired?"

"It's two in the morning."

"So what? It's Saturday."

"Both of you get out of my room." Felix growled.

"Did you get it out of your system?" Sylvain asked as he tossed the controller to the end of the bed and settled in among Felix's pillows. "Because I scored a date with these models. _Twins._ And I need someone to come with and be a rude jerk the whole time so they both like me in the end."

"Fuck you," Felix said, although there wasn't much vitriol behind his words. 

"Oh come on, you're gonna date this girl now? You went on one date with her."

"You can stay here if you want. I'll go sleep in one of the guest rooms."

"I'm glad you had a nice time, Felix," Dimitri said as he cracked open a can from a pack of beer Sylvain must have brought in. 

"Don't spill on my rug," Felix said as he pulled a pair of pajamas out of one of his drawers.

He took a quick shower before he claimed one of the guest rooms as his own. Sylvain and Dimitri stayed over so often they each had assigned rooms, but there were still plenty for Felix to choose from.

He was tired, actually, Sylvain was right. He could hear him and Dimitri shouting down the hall, and he blocked it out by thinking about the drawn out, high pitched sound Annette made as she came around him.

He was just as fucked now as he was after the first night that he met her. Probably even more so.

He was strangely okay with that, he thought as he turned on his side in the unfamiliar bed. It didn't take much longer for him to drift off to sleep.


	3. Pouring Rain

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felix trudges through some bad whether to avoid cancelling on Annette. He eats muffins the next morning.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi hello! So so sorry for making you guys wait so long for an update! I hope this story is still fun for you, because it's really fun for me. I'm going to try to update like, let's say once a month? I really fell off the writing train which sucks because I love writing and I need to incorporate it into my routine again. Please enjoy this chapter as much as I did!

_ Hey. sorry I’m running late. Been thinking of you all day. _

Felix glared down at his phone, his hand resting at his forehead beneath his bangs. 

Fuck. 

The office he shared with Glenn was dark. Felix had been working on his laptop in the office he shared with his brother at his father’s building in downtown Fhirdiad, and he neve bothered to get up and turn on the fancy recessed lights because he kept promising himself he’d be out of there before it got dark.

The sun set an hour ago. 

To his credit, he didn’t really notice the sun setting because Fhirdiad had been covered in thick, gray-black clouds that was dumping down rain in buckets since noon. Between that and the merger they were trying to make happen with a small company in Leicester, he hadn’t even had a chance to check the time since noon. 

Or his phone.

It had been three weeks and five days since he’d last seen Annette. The only reason he knew this off the top of his head was because they’d tried six times already to make plans, and something always got in the way. They were both adults with hectic schedules. Annette’s schedule was actually even less predictable than Felix’s, because she worked as a substitute, she tutored after school on weekdays, and on weekends she had odd singing gigs when her band could get them. 

Usually Felix could roll into the office an hour or two late and no one would notice or care, but this merger had culminated today into a meeting that was supposed to be three hours and lasted for  _ six, _ and Felix had been in a particularly bad mood because it put his plans with Annette in jeopardy  _ again. _

He’d missed a string of texts from Annette between 1 PM and 7PM, and after that he’d been sorting through paperwork with Glenn, his father, and the business lawyer that Felix had known since he was a kid. 

So now it was after 8PM and Annette had stopped texting him an hour and a half ago, probably thinking that he was standing her up.

The office door closed and when Felix looked up Glenn was rifling around on his own desk looking for something. “Want a ride, Fe?”

His phone vibrated in his hand, and he forgot not to look too eager when he opened the text. 

_ Look who remembered he has a cell phone! _

He glanced up at Glenn, who was still shuffling things around on his desk. Felix got the feeling that he was watching him out of the corner of his eye. 

“Are you going home?” Felix asked while he typed out a message to Annette.

_ Sorry. Honestly. This merger meeting ran late. Couldn’t have my phone on. _

He got the feeling that Annette was pretty annoyed. He didn’t know whether he should give her space or show up with a bouquet of flowers or something.

“No. This weather is terrible. I told Ingrid I was going to stay over with you and the old man.”

His phone vibrated again and he glanced down at it.

_ Uh huh, Mr. Important. Did you still want to come over? _

“I’m not coming home right away,” Felix answered as he pulled his jacket out of the small closet just to the left of their door. “Got stuff to do.”

“What could you possibly have to do that can’t wait for better weather?”

“Stuff,” Felix repeated. He spotted Glenn’s keys underneath a torn envelope, and he handed them to him. “Don’t wait up for me.”

Glenn raised an eyebrow at his younger brother, but Felix was already pushing the door open as he typed a reply to Annette.

_ I'm on my way now. _

He nervously clutched his phone as the light above the elevator indicated its arrival to the top floor.

As the elevator descended, Felix's phone buzzed.

_ Are you sure? There's a hurricane outside right now. We could take a literal rain check. _

Looking at the rain through soundproofed windows didn't do it justice. Wind tore through the small trees that were planted into the sidewalks. Manhole covers rattled in the streets. The usual sounds of the city were amplified by tires on wet pavement and rain pinging off metal. Rain was rushing down subway stairs and the sound of rushing water roared through sewer grates.

The driver he ordered was waiting for him in a Fraldarius company car, an all black SUV with heavily tinted windows that didn’t seem bothered by the horrific weather.

Felix didn't bother fighting against the wind with an umbrella and he slid into the back seat as quickly as possible. The few feet between the curb and the door of the lobby was enough to send rainwater dripping down his bangs. 

"Third and Main, sir?" the driver asked, blissfully uninterested in striking up a conversation about the weather.

"Yeah."

"Traffic might be a bit of an issue," the driver said as he pulled out into the street. 

"It’s fine." 

_ I'm already on my way,  _ Felix typed into his phone. 

Now that he was in the car on his way to her apartment, excitement was building in his chest. Sure, it had only been a few weeks since he'd seen her last, but he'd been thinking of seeing her again since the night of their date.

His phone vibrated again.

_ Problem,  _ the text read. She sent another immediately after.  _ One of the manholes is backing up. Water everywhere. _

Felix but his lip to suppress a sigh.  _ Where? _

_ Literally right outside my apartment,  _ she responded quickly. A second later she included a photo that was clearly taken from her living room of the street filling with water. 

_ I'm almost there. 5 minutes. _

_ OK but I think they're redirecting traffic.  _ The next message included a photo of red and blue lights reflecting off of windows, although he couldn't see a cop in the photo.

Of course this would happen.

He didn't say anything to the driver, but as they approached her street traffic came to a standstill. Cars were honking and the sound of wipers on the windshield matched the tempo of Felix's heartbeat. 

"There seems to be a problem, Sir," the driver said apologetically. 

"How far are we?" Felix demanded impatiently. 

"Five blocks."

"Can't you bring me any closer?" Felix asked, to which the driver only responded yes, sir, and Felix tried not to be too much of a nuisance with his annoyed tapping on the door. 

Five minutes turned into fifteen, and the honking grew louder as they approached Annette's street. "We're being redirected, Sir," the driver informed him, and through the tinted windows Felix could see a cop silhouetted against flashing lights. 

"Thanks. Just stop for a second."

Cars behind them were already honking, so Felix tried to be quick about leaping into the street. Water drenched him past his ankles, and his hair was immediately plastered to his scalp.

He tried to duck underneath building awnings or underneath sidewalk sheds to keep out of the rain directly, but even under scant shelter the wind blew most of it into him anyway. Water dripped down his hood and soaked his bangs, and for the first time that evening he began to wonder if this was really worth it. 

His phone vibrated in the front pocket of his jeans. It was probably Annette worrying about him. 

The street was filled with water rushing downtown, following the slight slope of the city and the push of the wind southward. He crossed at the crosswalk, not that it really mattered because traffic was stopped here. The cops who were directing cars away from the water bubbling up out of the street were wearing clear ponchos, and not one of them bothered to ask Felix where he thought he was going.

Annette’s building had a glass door which opened up to a small vestibule, and inside of that was a list of names hooked up to a phone system. He punched the button next to  _ Dominic, A. _ , and after only a few moments the heavy lock on the door clicked open and he was in the building. 

Water was dripping off of him like he’d just come up from a swim in the Airmid River, and the air conditioning in the halls of the building chilled him beneath his jacket. 

He took the six flights of stairs to her apartments--his father had retro-fitted all of his buildings in the city with elevators, Felix didn’t see how property managers could be so cheap as to leave people with obnoxious walk-ups--and the maroon carpet and white walls lining the hallway of apartment entrances was a relief. He felt like a damn knight or something on his way to rescue a princess from a tower. 

He shook the thought out of his head, and the bangs out of his eyes, and he pulled his phone out of his pocket to scroll through the messages just to make sure that he remembered the number correctly. 

A potted plant, all ferny leaves and no flowers, against a small stand and a sort of doily made of macramé decorated the space between her door and the hall, he remembered it from last time. 

His heart swelled in his chest and he felt nervous all at once, and before he could psych himself out he pressed on the doorbell.

The door swung open quickly and he stepped inside, and before he could think of what to say or how to say it, Annette was dabbing at him with a fluffy yellow towel. 

“Felix! You’re soaking! What, did you swim here?”

“Ah,” he stammered, and now that he was standing still he realized that his jeans were plastered to his legs from the knees down. “It’s raining.”

“Yeah, I know! That’s why they call it a  _ raincheck!” _ She was standing on her tiptoes to reach his hair, which she was vigorously rubbing at with the towel.

He snatched it from her, growing irritated, and when she reached to take it back he wrapped his fingers around her wrist to still her. “ _ Annette,” _ he said sternly, and her eyes widened apologetically as she looked up at him. 

It was then that he realized she was wearing a robe, deep red with long ribbon around the waist cinching it together and a short hem. The sleeves were made of some kind of translucent material.

The back of his throat was suddenly dry, and he tried to swallow past the sensation as he looked to her eyes once more. Her cheeks were flushed, and he was wondering if, somehow, he’d done something wrong when she took the lapel of his jacket and tugged at it gently. 

“You should get out of these wet clothes.”

As uncomfortable as he was in his cold, damp clothes, he felt heat rush down to pool beneath his stomach so quickly that he was almost lightheaded. “If you say so,” he replied when he realized that he should say something, and she helped him push the jacket off his shoulders. The material was waterlogged, heavy and stiff, and before he shrugged his arms free of the sleeves Annette was reaching up to kiss him.

Her lips were so warm against his, and when she cupped his jaw with one of her hands, the warmth from her skin made her bend down to her even more, like a sunflower seeking the light of the sun. 

He wrenched one arm free of its sleeve and pulled her firmly into him by her hip. The material of the robe was silky and soft, and his fingers slipped over it and down toward the hem easily.

“Felix!” she squealed, and she pulled away before he could react. “You’re dripping all over me! And you’re freezing!” The front of her robe where she’d pressed into him was wet, and it clung to her even more than it had been. "You'll catch a cold."

"Worth it," he muttered, and careful not to press his wet clothes against her, he bent to kiss her again.

She groaned against his mouth, a conversational sound, but she didn't pull away again. Instead she opened her mouth beneath his and worked at untucking his shirt from his pants and undoing the buttons. His plain white undershirt was absolutely soaked, sticking to him uncomfortably, and Annette raked the tips of her fingers up it, over his abdomen to the drooping collar. Her fingers were warm and blazed a burning trail over his skin, and when she slipped her hand beneath the hem of his shirt he couldn’t help the low-pitched moan that escaped from his lips as he kissed her even more fervently. 

“Felix,” Annette murmured, and when he opened his eyes to look down at her he could only focus on kiss-bitten lips. “Let’s go.”

It took a moment for him to blink away the fog in his head. “Go where?”

Annette smirked at him, amused, and she gestured to the narrow stairs leading up to her lofted bedroom. “Come on,” she said, and she tugged him by the wrist after her, as though he could possibly resist following wherever she went. 

As she led him up the stairs, he could just see the pale roundness of her ass peeking out from beneath her robe. He almost lost his balance, but Annette still had his arm in her grasp and pulled him into her playfully. 

The space in the loft wasn’t very big, and most of the wall space was crammed with books fitted into mismatched bookshelves, each one a different size and color, but all of the crammed full of books. The shelves were so full that she’d even stacked some books on their sides in front of neatly shelved ones. 

Annette raked her nails over the nape of his neck as she kissed him, backing up to the edge of her bed as she did. When her legs made contact with the mattress, she scrambled onto it until she was kneeling in front of him. He bent to claim her mouth again but she ducked away, scooting back and just out of his reach. 

Wordlessly, she pulled at the tie clasping her robe together, and when she let it fall away from her body Felix was greeted by possibly the most adorably sexy piece of lingerie a woman had worn for him. 

Dorothea preferred lace and sculpted pieces, dark colors that made her look like a dangerous seductress, but Annette’s sheer white bra with flowers embroidered onto it and matching panties with ruffles at the hips made him feel like he’d never truly seen a woman before. 

The deep scarlet tint her cheeks had taken on only made her look even sexier, and he didn’t mind how big and round and bright her eyes were as she studied him and his reaction critically. 

“Annette you look… amazing,” Felix choked when he remembered how to speak. 

“Oh, this?” she asked coyly, although a pleased smile was pulling at her cheeks. “It’s just something I had laying around.”

She was still keeping out of his reach, although she’d drawn her legs up in front of her in order to give Felix a better view. He leaned forward and closed his fingers around her ankle before pulling her toward him, to the edge of the bed. She squealed as he pulled her, and her entire face was scarlet as he loomed over her. 

“Felix,” she squeaked, and she brought her hands to the waistband of his pants, which were now uncomfortably tight, and she slipped them beneath his shirt to pull it up over his head. While he was still flinging the rain-damp shirt to the floor, she pulled into him to press sucking kisses to his chest and his collarbone. Her tongue warmed his skin, and he combed his fingers from her scalp to the tips of her hair three times before using her hair to pull her off of him and into the bed. 

To avoid getting her bed damp, he unzipped his pants and pulled them down impatiently before descending on her. 

He trapped her against the bed with his elbow at her side, and as he pressed his lips into the crook of her neck she sighed and wrapped her legs around his waist. Just the material of their undergarments separated them now, and the warmth pooling in Felix’s belly and throbbing through his cock was making him impatient. 

He took one of her breasts in his hand, pinching her nipple through the thin, sheer material, and she arched her back into him, encouraging. She was grinding against his cock, whimpering as he brought his mouth down over the material of her bra. Her nails scratched against his scalp a little too roughly, but he didn’t mind it. 

The pale white skin of her breast where it peeked out from the loosely sculpted cup was covered in purpling marks, which he thought looked particularly pretty against the embroidered flowers.

He continued kissing his way down her torso, dipping his tongue into the space between her ribs, leaving more bruising marks against the pale skin of her hip, just above the adorable ruffle of the sheer panties. 

She was wound tightly, and when he pressed his fingers against the heat of her folds she cried out, high pitched, needy. 

His cock throbbed at the sound, and she definitely felt it against her thigh. She sat up as much as he would allow her and pushed down his boxers enough to run her fingers over his length. 

“Annette,” Felix murmured, hoping he didn’t sound as wrecked as he suspected he did. The way she looked at him through her lowered lashes made it difficult to care. He let her work him over with her fingers, not enough to truly get any satisfaction from it, but enough to tide himself over for the moment. 

He took a step back, out of her reach, and dropped to his knees. A bright orange rug beneath her bed extended far out enough on both sides of her bed to offer a cushion, so it wasn’t really uncomfortable when he pulled both her knees over her shoulder. He kissed a wet, open-mouthed trail of kisses from her thigh to apex of her legs, above the sheer white material, and then he pulled the material down her legs quickly and licked a languorous stripe up her slit to the dense bud at the top. 

She was making unintelligible noises, desperate, keening notes, lilting and breathy and delicious. The taste was musky and sweet, bright, pleasant overall.

She reached for his hair, her nails scraping him hard, but he continued licking at her slowly, listening carefully to the noises she made and trying to encourage his favorite ones. Her grip in his hair became more desperate, pulling, and he had to press his palm against one of her hips to keep her still enough to keep working her up. 

“Felix,” she nearly sobbed, and he stilled long enough to raise his gaze up to her face, which was pleasantly flushed, pupils as dark as the stormy night sky outside. “Please.”

He pressed his tongue into her clit as he sucked against it, then drew back lazily. “Please what?”

Her legs were shaking, but she pushed herself into a sitting position so she could pull him from his knees so he was leaning over her once again. She looked up at him, her hair visibly more tangled than it had been minutes ago, and she bashfully said, “Please. Fuck me.”

The excited tingles that zipped around his heart sank deep into his gut, and he pulled her flush against him as he stood at the edge of the bed, her thighs pressed so far back they were almost against the mattress. “If you insist,” he said, and the annoyed look that crossed her features at his teasing pulled at his chest. 

Before she had time to protest, he lined himself up at her entrance, slick and ready, and he shifted his hips into hers as she tightened her fingers around his forearms. He entered slowly, giving her some time to adjust to the position, and when she began to impatiently rock her hips he used her pace to set a rhythm. 

Annette seemed so much smaller than him, her head barely reaching his shoulder when they were both barefoot, but right now it didn’t seem to matter much. She was more flexible than he would have thought, too, and she rested her thigh against his chest as he drove into her. 

"Oh," Annette sighed, and she twisted her fingers into her brightly colored duvet and shifted her hips against him. 

The rhythm he set was quick but not punishing, and her breasts bounced in her sheer bra in a way that made him bite his lip. Her fingers came up to grasp at his forearms, and her head was thrown back against the mattress, her hair splayed out like a ginger halo. 

She was letting out soft, breathy moans as he rocked her into the mattress, and as the hot, liquid coil wound ever tighter deep in his belly he leaned over to kiss a trail from the pale skin peeking out from the sheer fabric of her bra to her collarbone and then her jaw. 

Her skin was warm, and flushed from her cheeks down to her neck and her chest. Her hair at the nape of her neck was growing damp, and she’d moved her legs to wrap around Felix’s hips to keep him close. 

“Felix,” she gasped, and when she looked up at him her eyes were dark and her lids heavy. “I’m close.”

He rocked into her harder, pulling her hips into him with his hands so high up on the backs of her thighs, he was almost grabbing fistfuls of her ass. 

Her legs spasmed around him, pushing him deeper inside, and she cried out as she clenched around him, pushing herself up to rest on palms and adjust the angle. Her back arched as she threw her head back and her eyes squeezed shut, and Felix wanted to bend forward and kiss her on the mouth or the jaw or down her neck. 

It was all he could to keep fucking her though, his own release edging closer and closer. His hair was already damp from the rain outside, and as sweat collected on his forehead he could feel his bangs sticking to his face. 

Annette panted and flopped back flat on the bed, overstimulating him as the angle shifted again. He held one of her knees, which had gone slack, in place around his hips, and as she opened one gray-blue eye at him he leaned over her. He tried to slow up his pace and keep his thrusts deep. One of Annette’s hands came up to bury itself in his damp hair, and the other stroked up and down his back, letting her nails scratch lightly at his skin. 

He came with a single choked cry, monosyllabic and nonsensical, and he buried his face into the soft skin of her shoulder as he released into her. 

He was panting lightly, his breath making goosebumps pop up on Annette’s skin, and as soon as he could summon the energy, he rolled off of her so they were both laying horizontally on her bed, side by side.

She made an indignant tone and he glanced over to her, curious but ultimately unbothered. 

“Felix!” she cried as she clambered into a sitting position. “Look what you did! Monster!”

He dropped his eyes to her hands, where she was holding sheer material that he realized must have been her panties. A tear in the seam at the hip rendered them completely unwearable, and she tossed them at him. 

“That was my favorite set,” she added mournfully.

“I’ll get you another,” he told her nonchalantly, and he swung his legs over the side of the bed and stretched out his shoulders. 

A sound between a scoff and snort escaped her lips, and Felix couldn’t help but find it adorable. “You can’t  _ buy _ me  _ lingerie _ .” 

“I can’t?”

“Of course you can’t. Boyfriends buy their girlfriends stuff. Friends with benefits can like, get each other chocolate or something on their birthdays.”

“I don’t like chocolate.”

“This is why we aren’t dating!”

Felix rolled his eyes. “I did damage your property.”

“Well,” Annette said slowly. “I mean, I can get another pair of panties to match this, even if it’s not this one. It’s not a big deal.”

“I have your address, so it’s not exactly like I need your permission to buy you whatever I like.”

“You’re always teasing me,” she said sourly, and her cheeks were tinted pink. 

“It’s fun,” he said simply. 

She frowned at him, then she scooted off the bed to approach a dresser and began rooting through it. “Listen, I know we both have work tomorrow. Why don’t you stay here overnight? It’s a mess outside. Maybe by the morning they’ll get the sewer under control, at least.”

He reached for his boxers as he said, hesitantly, “I didn’t bring a change in clothes.”

“You don’t have to stay! I’m just saying, I’m not going to kick you out into a monsoon.”

He glanced over to the windows below them, the ones that framed Annette’s living room. Rain was still coming down in buckets, and lightning occasionally flashed in the inky black sky. 

“I guess I should.” When he looked over to Annette she was wearing a pair of fabric shorts and a camisole. He could see the red love bites he’d left over her chest. 

“I leave super early to get to work on time, so just stay here until you have to leave for work. Lock the door behind you when you go. I have like, plenty of stuff to eat here.

Annette left him in the loft to take a shower, and while he was sitting on her bed he tried searching on the internet for a comparable lingerie set to match the one he’d torn. When she returned to bed she smelled nice, sweet like fruit. 

He didn’t kiss her good night or anything, even though the shape of her swollen, kiss-bitten lips were playing in his mind, and they fell asleep on opposite sides of her bed scrolling on their phones. 

The next morning, he woke up to the reddest sunrise he’d ever seen and a face full of Annette’s hair. He pretended to be asleep as she wiggled out of his arms and covered him up with the blankets they’d wrinkled during the night. She slipped out of bed and he had to stop himself from reaching for her and pulling her back into bed with him. 

It was just past 5 AM, and Felix had two more hours to sleep. Even with the ungodly amount of noise Annette was making in the kitchen, he drifted back to sleep until his alarm woke him at 7:30. He pulled on his clothes from yesterday, which Annette had hung up when she got out of her shower, and he found a plate piled with muffins and an orange sticky note on the counter. 

_ Made muffins this morning! They’re walnut and spice flavored, nothing sweet. Have a good day at work! -Annie _

Her handwriting was loopy and big and it somehow reminded him of her personality. He spotted a pen on her counter and added a note of his own to the other side. 

_ Had fun last night. Thanks for the food. -F _

He pulled out his phone to call over a company driver and he ate the muffin as he waited. It was pretty good, actually. It reminded him of something his mother would make for him when he was a kid, before he hated sweets.

Glenn was already there when he turned on his work laptop, although he didn’t look up at Felix until he slung his jacket over the back of the chair. 

“Didn’t come home last night,” Glenn observed, glancing at him before returning to whatever work he was already doing. 

“No,” Felix agreed. 

“Where’d you go? Dima’s?”

Felix scowled over at him. “None of your damn business.”

Glenn opened his mouth to either retort or press him about it, but at that moment their father entered the office to tell them how well they’d done the day before. 

No one said anything about Felix wearing the same clothes he had been yesterday.


End file.
